Building a Marriage pages - WaterBrook & Multnomah...INTRODUCTION Ourlivesarelivedmomentbymoment,inincrementswecanactu-allyhandle.Ourmarriagesarelivedthesameway.Notanniversary toanniversaryorevenmonthtomonth,butdaily

LoveWar

DevotionalforCouples

The 8-week adventure that will help you findthe marriage you always dreamed of

J OHN S TA S IE L D R EDG EBest-selling authors ofWild at Heart and Captivating

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LOVE ANDWAR DEVOTIONAL FOR COUPLESPUBLISHED BYWATERBROOK PRESS12265 Oracle Boulevard, Suite 200Colorado Springs, Colorado 80921

All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New Interna-tional Version®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by Biblica Inc.TM Used by permissionof Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com. Scripture quotations marked(NASB) are taken from the New American Standard Bible®. © Copyright The Lockman Foundation1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995. Used by permission. (www.Lockman.org). Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation,copyright © 1996, 2004. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Wheaton, Illinois60189. All rights reserved.

ISBN 978-0-307-72993-4ISBN 978-0-307-72994-1 (electronic)

Copyright © 2011 by John Eldredge and Stasi Eldredge

Cover design by Kristopher K. Orr

Published in association with Yates & Yates, www.yates2.com.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by anymeans, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any informationstorage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

Published in the United States byWaterBrook Multnomah, an imprint of the Crown PublishingGroup, a division of Random House Inc., New York.

WATERBROOK and its deer colophon are registered trademarks of Random House Inc.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication DataEldredge, John, 1960–Love and war devotional for couples : the 8-week adventure that will help you find the marriage

you always dreamed of / John and Stasi Eldredge.—1st ed.p. cm.ISBN 978-0-307-72993-4—ISBN 978-0-307-72994-1 (electronic) 1. Spouses—Prayers and

devotions. 2. Marriage—Religious aspects—Christianity—Meditations. I. Eldredge, Stasi. II. Title.BV4596.M3E43 2011242'.644—dc22

2010027090

Printed in the United States of America2011—First Edition

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

SPECIAL SALESMost WaterBrook Multnomah books are available at special quantity discounts when purchasedin bulk by corporations, organizations, and special interest groups. Custom imprinting orexcerpting can also be done to fit special needs. For information, please e-mail [email protected] or call 1-800-603-7051.

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CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . vii

WEEK ONE: Remembering What We Wanted . . . . . . . . . 1

WEEK TWO: The Two Shall Become One . . . . . . . . . . . 17

WEEK THREE: The Journey . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

WEEK FOUR: Companionship . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51

WEEK FIVE: Your Spouse Is Not Your Enemy . . . . . . . . 67

WEEK SIX: The Little Foxes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85

WEEK SEVEN: Increasing Intimacy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101

WEEK EIGHT: The Most Excellent Way . . . . . . . . . . . . 119

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INTRODUCTION

Our lives are livedmoment bymoment, in increments we can actu-

ally handle. Ourmarriages are lived the same way. Not anniversary

to anniversary or evenmonth tomonth, but daily—in the ordinary

ins and outs of time. The choices we make in the moments create

the lives we enjoy—or don’t.Thus, a love and war devotional.This

devotional is a tool for you, for your marriage. We invite you to

walk alongside us for eight weeks—five days a week—and dive

deeper into the tangible realities of your marriage. We’ll focus on

Scripture and the heart of God and the heart that he placed in you

and the heart he has placed in your spouse.

The journey of our lives is a journey of transformation.We are

here to learn how to love. How do we learn?Moment bymoment.

Day by day.Week by week. Ourmarriages grow and become what

God intended and what we ultimately long for in the same way.We

are all of us learning to love.

Let’s learn together.

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S

WEEK ONE

RememberingWhat We Wanted

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DAY 1

Romance Meets Reality

SWe love because he first loved us.

—1 JOHN 4:19

Weprobably ought to just start here: marriage is fabulously hard.

Maybe that’s an odd way to begin, but it is true, and every-

body who’s beenmarried knows this, though years intomarriage it

still catches us off guard, all of us. And newlymarried couples, when

they discover how hard it is, seem genuinely surprised. Shocked and

disheartened by the fact.Are we doing something wrong? Did I marry

the right person? The wonders that lure us intomarriage—romance,

love, passion, sex, longing, companionship—sometimes seem so

far from the actual reality of married life that we wind up fearing

we’ve made a colossal mistake, caught the wrong bus, missed our

flight. And so the hardness of marriage can also come as something

of an embarrassment.


Ormaybe it’s just us. Don’t you feel embarrassed to admit how

hard your marriage is?

Yep.This is everyone.Wemight as well come out and admit it.

The sooner we get that shame off our backs, the sooner we’ll

find our way through. Of course marriage is hard. In fact, if you

look back at the first marriage, that fairy-tale start in Genesis, you

see that Adam and Eve had a pretty rough go at it. And they didn’t

even have parents to screw them up as children or friends giving

them ridiculous advice. The fall of man seems to come during the

honeymoon or shortly thereafter. (And how many honeymoon

stories seem to reenact that little drama?) They hit rough water as

soon as they set sail. This is the story of the first marriage, and it’s

a bit sobering.

But it also gives us some encouragement. It’s normal for mar-

riage to be hard. Even the best of marriages.

And God is in that.

In order to have the life we want, the life we are made for, and

the marriage we long for, we need God. That’s a very good thing!

Because without him, nothing is as it should be. With him, all

things are possible. Yes, marriage can be extremely hard. But that

is not a reason to despair. Nor is it the final truth.There are seasons

in marriage—in every relationship. Marriage is meant to be won-

derful, and most of the time it is. Though it’s sometimes so hard,

think of the difficulty as a doorway. A doorway to all themore Jesus

has for us in himself ! There is hope!

4 Remembe r i n g Wha t We Wan t e d


S

Dear God, as I begin this study, I offer up this time foryour purposes. Please help me draw closer to your heartand deepen my marriage in every good way. Sometimesit is very hard. Even painful. I invite you into that aswell. Have your way with me, with my spouse, andwith our marriage. We need you. I am looking to you.In Jesus’ mighty name, amen.

Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings,

because we know that suffering produces persever-

ance; perseverance, character; and character, hope.

And hope does not disappoint us, because God

has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy

Spirit, whom he has given us. (Romans 5:3–5)

5Roman c e Me e t s Re a l i t y


DAY 2

Recovering Desire

S“What do you want?”—Jesus

—JOHN 1:38

Somewhere along the way, we all lose heart in marriage. Weall do. It happens to the best of us. The Dan Fogelberg song

“Along the Road” speaks of a relationship that has “joy at the

start,” and suggests that along the journey, the heart “gets lost in the

learning.”

We might find a way to manage our disappointment. We

might do our best to fight off resignation, but it works its way in.

We let go of what we wanted, what we dreamed of, what we were

created for. We begin to settle. Oftentimes we even forget what it

was we wanted in the first place!

Because marriage is hard, sometimes painfully hard, your first

great battle is not to lose heart. That begins with recovering


desire—the desire for the love that is written on your heart. Let

desire return. Let it remind you of all that you wanted, all that you

were created for. And then consider this—what if God could bring

you your heart’s desire?What if the two of you could find your way

to something beautiful?

That would be worth fighting for.

Don’t start with, How can that happen? The how will come

in time. You have to begin with desire. Start with what is writ-

ten on your heart. What was it that you once dreamed of as a

young man or woman?What was it you wanted when you fell in

love?

Father, thank you for my marriage. Thank you for myspouse. Lord, you know where we are with each otherright now. You know the desires we each had cominginto our marriage even if they were unclear to us. Andonly you know the dreams you have for our marriage.Once again, I give my marriage to you. I surrendermyself, my spouse, and our life to you, and I ask foryour will to be done in us and through us. Holy Spirit,blow gently onto the embers of our heart’s desires wherewe have forgotten or abandoned what you placedthere. Rekindle the flame. Remind us. And help uskeep our eyes on you as the source of all that is good

7Re c o v e r i n g De s i r e


Sand lovely and worth living for. Let hope rise. In Jesus’name, amen.

You open your hand and satisfy the desires

of every living thing. (Psalm 145:16)



DAY 3

A Glorious Difficulty

SHow good and pleasant it is when

brothers [and sisters] live together

in unity!

—PSALM 133:1

Marriage is glorious. And yes, sometimes marriage is difficult.

Okay. A lot of the time it is difficult. For everyone. This doesn’t

necessarily mean we are blowing it. Partly, it simply means we are

human beings. When John and I got married, we looked forward

to years of intimacy and laughter and the joy of being husband

and wife. Our expectations of ease andmarital bliss were quickly…

notmet.Wewere stunned.Most couples are. But, for heaven’s sake,

bringing together a man and a woman—two creatures who think,

act, and feel so differently—and asking them to get along for the

rest of their lives under the same roof is like taking Cinderella and


Huck Finn, tossing them in a submarine, and locking the hatch.

What should we think will happen?

Actually, before you lock the hatch, toss in the constant expe-

rience of all our fears, our wounded hearts, our self-centeredness,

our self-doubts, and our resolute commitments to self-protection.

Good Lord, help us. Anyone looking for undeniable proof of the

existence of God need look no further. The fact that any marriage

makes it is a miracle of the first order. Bona fide proof that there are

forces in the universe working on behalf of mankind.

Think of all those fairy tales about a boy and girl who find

themselves thrown together in a dangerous land, working together

while each carries a tragic flaw that pricks the other. Those fairy

tales have it right. The husband is that boy. The wife is that girl.

And your life is the adventure through that dangerous land.

But gloriously, we all are on the road to becoming the man or

the woman we are meant to be. To cooperate with God and yield

to his desires for our lives is what speeds the process. None of us is

perfect. In fact, many of our unique quirks are not so endearing!

Though we share much in common with our spouses, we are so

different from each other as well.Wonderfully, gloriously different.

Dear God, I surrender my life to you again today.I want to be the person that you have created me tobe. Please show me the areas in my life that I need



S

to repent of and be healed of. I want to change for thegood. I choose to cooperate with you. Lord, I pray tosee my life and my marriage the way you do. I don’twant to just eke by in our marriage. I want all the lifeand joy and victory and oneness that’s possible! In yourname, Jesus, I pray. Amen.

I can do everything through Christ, who gives

me strength. (Philippians 4:13, NLT)

11A G l o r i o u s D i f f i c u l t y


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Building a Marriage pages - WaterBrook & Multnomah...INTRODUCTION Ourlivesarelivedmomentbymoment,inincrementswecanactu-allyhandle.Ourmarriagesarelivedthesameway.Notanniversary toanniversaryorevenmonthtomonth,butdaily